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I guess it is cultural.
It is my experience that white people do not express their feelings as easily as black people. Black people have no problem with expressing their feelings, while white people generally try not to cause a scene (read: express what they truly feel). I don't think that it is a coincidence that Soul music is invented by black people.

I couldn't tell you how many times I've seen a white tv preacher practically barking at the audience. I think there is somewhat of a cultural difference in the manner in which black ministers and concregations express themselves and I think the music in black churches is beautiful.

When blacks were first brought to this country Christianity was forced on them. Christianity was a stark contrast to a lot of their religion in Africa where everyone was involved, but after a while they accepted it. All the yelling and shouting began because they felt so oppressed. They couldn't live the way they wanted, dress the way wanted, or even love the way they wanted, BUT they could worship anyway they saw fit. They sang loud songs of jubilation and of freedom. Passionate cries in the one place they were allowed to be loud. They took passages from the bible that encouraged joyous praises and amplified them. Loud singing and passionate dancing became a staple of black churches an they took it with them as they traveled throughout the country.

But, you see Southern white preachers being the same way with their congregation? Why? See, the plantation owner would often worship with his slaves, believe it or not. Many once only black/slave traits became a Southern trait all around as they shared it with their friends and families.

If you think they only only shout in black churches, you've obviously never been to a good old fashioned white Southern Baptist church.

This question should not offend anyone but I am really curious. Why is it that in most "black" churches the reverend/preacher always have to yell, shout, scream when giving a sermon? Ive never seen this done in any Catholic church Ive been to. Ive never seen it done at any synagogue Ive been to. Ive never seen it done at any buddhist temple Ive been to. Okay, I did see it in a white church in the movie "Borat"

Im just curious. Why yell and scream and shout and rhyme? Why cant the point be made in a regular speaking voice?

A church that has an enthusiastic preacher and participants that are truly filled with the spirit is much more inspiring to me than listening to a boring old (or young) uninspired white guy regurgitating biblical dribble to church full of repressed, zombified white folks.
If you aren't receiving that spirit, you're kinda dead. Perhaps you're threatened by the exuberance and excitement and are not embodied enough and too threatened to appreciate how the spirit is moving through the physical vehicle (which includes the voice).
If you have an experience in a really good black church of this kind and aren't feeling it, i'd say you're not capable of feeling the spirit in a whole way.
"A regular speaking voice" ? What's regular? To who?
Your post isn't offensive it's just an indication of a lack of openness to a different kind of spiritual expression than you are used to and a lack of expansiveness and willingness and/or capacity to truly feel the spirit all the way down to your toes and in the very nucleus of your cells.
And the music that comes out of black churches is the most inspired heart and soul filled expression of the spirit of all the many Christian streams.
And another poster mentioned slaver and the the African roots. Yes, true .... check it out.
Out of the most (2nd to Native Americans) oppressed and abused group of people in this country comes some of the purest and most sincere reaching toward and receiving of Christ and the Spirit. (i'm speaking generally mind you)

The so-called "screamin' churches" aren't so much "black churches" as those who have their roots in certain sects of Protestant Evangelicalism that sprang from the Great Awakening, mostly in the South. Go to any Pentecostal church, be it black, white, or multi-racial, and you'll see the same thing.

Go to any Pentecostal church, be it black, white, or multi-racial, and you'll see the same thing.

The multi-cultural Pentecostal church of my parents (and that I attended from age 0-14) is led by a white pastor who does not scream.
It does get lively, but no screaming pastors of any race there.

Still, the Catholic churches of some of my friends were downright stodgy in comparison. It was as if the leadership were as bored as the congregation.

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